Two Hams on the Road

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

We are camped at Beaumont Provincial Park, British Columbia, Canada.  It’s located on Fraser Lake, but unfortunately none of the campsites has a lake view.  But we didn’t do too bad.  We look out into a grove of what I think are aspen trees.

We’ve seen a lot of aspen, as many of the older pine trees have been killed by the mountain pine beetle.  Aspen seems to be the main tree filling in.

When we left Lac la Hache, our sliding hitch wouldn’t slide in.  This hitch allows us to tow a fifth wheel trailer without a long bed truck.  When we need to make sharp turns getting into and out of a campsite, extending the hitch gives us more flexibility.  We can tow with the hitch extended, but sliding it forward positions the weight of the trailer better on the truck.

So, Steve got on line and found a dealer for the hitch a few hours up the road in Quesnel, BC.  We use the Internet so much on the road, I don’t know how people did this before the Internet.  So we headed for Quesnel.  We are headed up highway 97, also known as the Cariboo Highway.  And in spite of what Word says, that’s the way it’s spelled on the signs.  No caribou sighted, though.

This is a land of rivers, lakes, ponds and swamps.  You sometimes see Canadian geese “floating” on grass, which looks odd until you realize there’s water there.  But at anytime you can round a curve and see water in some form.

Here’s a small pond:

And shortly after that was a lake.

And then a creek through a cow pasture.  We’ve seen lots of cows in herds much larger than we saw in the states.

I think this is the Fraser River joining us again.

We finally made it to Quesnel and after a stop at Walmart (no deli and standard can size seemed to be 28 oz.), we found the hitch dealer.  The mechanic who worked with us was young, but knew what he was doing.  It took awhile, but we were back in business and on the road again.  And the hitch has never worked as well as it does now.  Yay!

Our stop that night was Canyon Creek RV Park in Hixon, BC.  There are two things of interest in Hixon: Hixon Falls and the Take Out Restaurant.  At least that’s what was posted in the office. So after getting set up, Steve ran to the takeout and got dinner.  It was a good burger with bacon and mushrooms.

If we could have parked facing the opposite direction, we would have had a good view.

But it was a nice park and we enjoyed our stay.

The next day we headed for Hixon Falls, which was all of 5 miles away.  It’s spring and the wild flowers are out.  It reminded me of vacations we used to take in the Smokey Mountains.

The hike was a short hike, so I decided to try out the backpack I bought for Obi.  Since he’s gone blind, he doesn’t like to take walks and sometimes we can’t leave him behind.  Since all the dog backpacks I liked were in the $200 range, I decided to try a baby backpack.  He didn’t fuss at all and carrying him on this short hike went fine.  Of course he’s usually happy if one of his humans is within reach.

We did reach the waterfall and I think it’s the best one we’ve seen on this trip so far.

And since my picture got in this post, Steve’s should too.

Tomorrow, Thursday, we head for Hazelton, British Columbia, to join up with our caravan.  Everyone’s supposed to be there by Saturday and we head out on Tuesday, June 2.

Deb